Specializes in providing technical support for programming and policy to strengthen family care for children, including preventing unnecessary separation as well as family reunification and reintegration

He worked as a technical advisor for USAID’s Displaced Children and Orphans Fund for 25 years regarding highly vulnerable children and families, separated and unaccompanied children, former child soldiers, children orphaned or otherwise vulnerable due to HIV/AIDS, and other on care and protection issues. Prior to that, he was a consultant for USAID, UNICEF, and UNHCR and was on the staff of the Christian Children’s Fund (Now ChildFund). From 1980 to 1990 he was with UNHCR in Thailand and at headquarters in Geneva.

He co-authored Families, Not Orphanages (with Aaron Greenberg, Better Care Network, 2010), the Children on the Brink series (with Susan Hunter, USAID/UNICEF/UNAIDS 1997 & 2000), and Action for Children Affected by AIDS (with Sue Armstrong, UNICEF/WHO, 1994), and “Managing Uganda’s Orphans Crisis (John Alden and Gerald Salole, 1991). He was an editor (with Carol Levine and Geoff Foster) for A Generation at Risk: The Global Impact of HIV/AIDS on Orphans and Vulnerable Children, and wrote the chapter, “Finding a Way Forward: Reducing the Impacts of HIV/AIDS on Vulnerable Children and Families,” (Cambridge University Press, 2005).  He has also written on child soldiers, psychosocial programming, and situation analysis. While with UNCHR, he wrote the Handbook for Social Services (1984), edited the first Guidelines on Refugee Children (1988), and chaired the Working Group on Refugee Children. He has a master’s degree in social welfare from the University of California at Berkeley.